hose society he had fallen, many
things were laughed at, over which some folks looked grave. Faith and
honour were laughed at; pure lives were disbelieved; selfishness was
proclaimed as common practice; sacred duties were sneeringly spoken of,
and vice flippantly condoned. These were no Pharisees: they professed no
hypocrisy of virtue, they flung no stones at discovered sinners:--they
smiled, shrugged their shoulders, and passed on. The members of this
family did not pretend to be a whit better than their neighbours, whom
they despised heartily; they lived quite familiarly with the folks about
whom and whose wives they told such wicked, funny stories; they took
their share of what pleasure or plunder came to hand, and lived from day
to day till their last day came for them. Of course there are no such
people now; and human nature is very much changed in the last hundred
years. At any rate, card-playing is greatly out of mode: about that
there can be no doubt: and very likely there are not six ladies of
fashion in London who know the difference between Spadille and Manille.

"How dreadfully dull you must have found those humdrum people at that
village where we left you--but the savages were very kind to you,
child!" said Madame de Bernstein, patting the young man's cheek with her
pretty old hand.

"They were very kind; and it was not at all dull, ma'am, and I think
they are some of the best people in the world," said Harry, with his
face flushing up. His aunt's tone jarred upon him. He could not bear
that any one should speak or think lightly of the new friends whom he
had found. He did not want them in such company.

The old lady, imperious and prompt to anger, was about to resent the
check she had received, but a second thought made her pause. "Those two
girls," she thought, "a sick-bed--an interesting stranger--of course
he has been falling in love with one of them." Madame Bernstein looked
round with a mischievous glance at Lady Maria, who entered the room at
this juncture.

CHAPTER XXV. New Acquaintances

Cousin Maria made her appearance, attended by a couple of gardener's
boys bearing baskets of flowers, with which it was proposed to decorate
Madame de Bernstein's drawing-room against the arrival of her ladyship's
company. Three footmen in livery, gorgeously laced with worsted, set out
twice as many card-tables. A major-domo in black and a bag, with fine
laced ruffles; and looking as if he ought to hav